Budapest-Sofia flight to start next year?

Inforadio.hu reported that Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó agreed on the establishment of a joint economic committee at his Sofia meeting on Thursday. He told MTI (Hungarian news agency) in his phone interview that there probably will be a Budapest-Sofia direct flight again from 2017.

Hungarian companies are increasingly interested in the Bulgarian market, for example, OTP bank, Richter and Videoton already have significant capacities in the country and they want to expand. That is why the establishment of the joint committee has been accepted, inforadio.hu wrote.

The trade between the two countries exceeded 1 billion euros by the end of October which means a 9%-increase in one year.

The European Commission does not object to the public procurement to re-create the air-link between Budapest and the Balkan capitals, which the Hungarian government calls for. Szijjártó hopes that in the case of a successful procurement there will be a Budapest-Sofia direct flight from 2017.

The Foreign Minister regrets that the construction of South Stream has been removed from the agenda, but the Hungarian government is pleased that the European Commission supports Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Austria to connect their gas pipelines, so the Southern gas corridor will be connected to Central Europe.

According to inforadio.hu, Péter Szijjártó told: the Hungarian and the Bulgarian Foreign Ministries support the introduction of “the day of the Hungarian-Bulgarian friendship” which was initiated by the Bulgarian national advocate in the Hungarian Parliament on Wednesday (the minorities of Hungary have national advocates in the National Assembly).